All human discoveries seem to be made only for the purpose of confirming more and more strongly the truths come from on high and contained in the sacred writings.
— John Herschel (1792 - 1871), leading British astronomer and philosopher

Got Scientism? Champions of “Science” All Leftists

The Union of Concerned Scientists’ list of champions only includes those who take far-left political stances on the issues.

Live Science republished a list from the Union of Concerned Scientists by Seth Shulman, one of their senior staff writers. Under the title, “Got Science?Champions Who Stood Up for Science in 2013,” the list is noteworthy for its extreme leftist bias. Even though his list of six champions promises to include those “from every political persuasion,” the two arguably conservative entrants were nevertheless praised for standing against other conservatives on political issues. The list appears to equate “science” with left-leaning political positions on each issue, such as:

Evolution: Kentucky Governor Steven Beshear is honored for opposing the strong majority in the legislative committee that opposed the Next Generation Science Standards that teach evolution and global warming as fact without any evidence against it.

Climate Change: Jennifer Jurado is praised for working with President Obama to prepare some Florida counties for rising sea levels expected from climate change.

Fracking: Kelly Giddens is a champion for opposing fracking in Colorado, a practice that could make the United States energy independent, create jobs, and actually reduce carbon emissions.

Censorship: Paul Thornton is praised for getting the L.A. Times to cease printing any letters critical of global warming.

Solar Power: The lone conservative in the group, Debbie Dooley of the Atlanta Tea Party, is honored for her “green tea party” action by standing against the Koch brothers and advocating expansion of solar power.

Climate Science: Al Dutcher, a climatologist the article says is a “self-described conservative” is praised for standing up against conservatives on the issue of global warming.

Shulman is half right when he says:

With Congressional partisanship reaching unprecedented levels and science too frequently under attack from a vocal minority, it’s all the more vital to stand up for the basic idea that choices should be informed by the best evidence and data available. That means insisting that kids are taught solid science unfettered by political or religious doctrine, that people face up to what’s actually known about the climate realities we confront, and that we draw a bright line to differentiate science-based fact from politically motivated disinformation.

– but he is half-wrong when he assumes “politically motivated disinformation” is a one-party problem. Our previous entry (12/09/13) showed that scientists are not immune from the herd mentality and the many human foibles that beset most other people – perhaps more. Other entries have shown (although this is common knowledge) that denizens of academia and the press tend to be predominantly leftist. For Shulman, therefore, to list only scientists who equate advocating leftist political positions with “standing up for science” says more about his ideology than the solidity of the evidence.

Got evidence? It’s not evidence until it stands up to the best that critics have to say. It’s pretty clear that Shulman and Live Science have taken up positions on evolution, climate change and energy policy by (1) assumption, (2) herd mentality, (3) political bias, or (4) all of the above, without doing a proper literature search on the best arguments of critics of the leftist positions. Instead, they commandeer “consensus science” as props for their chosen positions, accusing anyone who disagrees with them of being “anti-science.”

But if the qualification is to “stand up for science,” why didn’t they list Stephen Meyer, whose best-seller Darwin’s Doubt stood up against the dogmatic, intolerant, anti-evidence Darwin Party over the issue of the Cambrian Explosion? As for climate change, there are also spokespersons against the global-warming hysteria who have expertise not beholden to the Koch brothers or any other bogeymen, but whose voices are routinely squelched by the media. In a phony show of bipartisanship, they listed two “conservatives,” but only when they advocated leftist positions or compromised with them.

You can tell a leftist. They are characterized by emotion over logic, dogmatism, simplistic unworkable answers (like “visualize world peace”), improper characterization of science as a uniform support for leftism, scare tactics, a desire to control their fellow human beings, the belief that government is the answer to everything (that’s why leftist is roughly equivalent to statist), hatred for the successful, disgust with religion, tendency to fall for utopian dreams, belief in equality of outcome instead of equality of opportunity, a desire to make everyone equally miserable, a herd mentality, undying faith in the UN and globalism, rejection of traditional values, promotion of those who tear down traditional values, advocacy of unlimited abortion, a collective mindset instead of respect for individual rights, impatience with debate (claiming “the science is settled – nothing to debate here”), amnesia over leftist failures (e.g., French revolution, communism), propensity to mischaracterize conservative views, readiness to label conservatives with hate-words, heavy use of cliches (like “social justice” and “global governance”), a bad habit of hiding their own radical positions behind euphemisms (like “reproductive health” for “abortion”) but attributing the worst motives (like “racism”) to their opponents, advocacy of politically-correct speech codes, no sense of responsibility, inability to answer a straight question without veering into talking points, reticence to apologize when proven wrong, tolerance of perversion, tendency to view everything in evolutionary terms (especially the Constitution), embrace of the myth of progress, devotion to Father Charlie Darwin, and shoddy scholarship. A quicker way to tell a leftist is to look for those with sour, dour, snooty looks on their faces. You can tell a leftist, but you can’t tell it* much.

*Gender-neutral pronoun used in deference to the Left to avoid uncomfortableness with gender distinctions.

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2 Comments

mrsmithDecember 10, 2013

Thank you for highlighting this op-ed. Your list of leftist characteristics is spot-on! Sad, but true.

rockywayDecember 10, 2013

“…it’s all the more vital to stand up for the basic idea that choices should be informed by the best evidence and data available. That means insisting that kids are taught solid science unfettered by political or religious doctrine…”

Shulman is confused. There’s no such thing as ”science” unfettered by ‘religion’ or politics. e.g. the very idea money should be forcibly taken from people and handed out to researchers is a political notion. The very idea the universe is deserving of study is a ‘religious’ idea. The idea something called reality (or truth, objectivity, etc.) exists is a religious idea.

- Vital? if all were merely matter in motion nothing would be or could be vital… and the very idea would be, at best, a delusion.

- How can someone who believes reality consists merely of matter in motion defend an agenda of forced indoctrination? You can’t get ethics from physics. And how is it these people always manage to forget their previous professions of Materialism when they give us their sermons? Have they forgotten sitting beneath the knees of Richard Dawkins and singing, “The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.”

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